Early BDUs with white labels, big collars, and open-faced SP4 rank

[MattS]

I found this set in my travels today. Early 1981 dated BDUs with open-faced specialist rank, 70th Division SSI. Came with 1982 dated early trousers and they are in excellent shape! Any comments welcome!

[MattS]

Rank and SSI.

[MattS]

White label

[Andrew]

That's a nice top - I pick up early patched BDUs with the white labels when I find them in thrift shops. It's always a bonus when they have an unusual feature such as the SPC rank in this case.

[HoovieDude]

Oh how hated those Elvis collars were!!!

[MattS]

Thanks for the comments! When we would switch over to "winter-weight" BDUs, it was a game to spot the old Elvis-collar tops. And then of course to make fun of whoever was wearing them (assuming you out-ranked them)!

[HoovieDude]

I once made a remark to a 3 star that he was the single person in the Army that the Elvis collars made any sense for. Plenty of room for his rank When the lightweights arrived, I only kept the required 2 sets of the "winters" for schools, etc.. And never wore them again. Even in winter. It was the light weights all the way baby! Hated those thick, poly, swealtering things.

[MattS]

I spent 2 years at Fort Hood, not much need for the heavy weight uniforms there!

[capa]

I went through Parris Island in the summer of 1983 wearing those things. Well, we wore white t-shirts and the chrome domes most of the time. The pants were on the warm side.

[19delta-uav]

In early 2004 I was issued DCUs to gp over to Iraq. I had like 3 Elvis collar winters and 1 regular summer weight DCU set. I hated those Elvis collars and thank god the laundry lost some of my uniforms so that I was then reissued new summer weight uniforms with regular collars.

[Linedoggie]

I spent 2 years at Fort Hood, not much need for the heavy weight uniforms there!

Before allowing us to wear OD Jungle Fatigues in 83 or 84 you had no real choice but the winter weights at Hood

[MattS]

Before allowing us to wear OD Jungle Fatigues in 83 or 84 you had no real choice but the winter weights at Hood

 

I can almost imagine how uncomfortable that was. Walking around on the tarmac at Hood Army Airfield (that awful movie "Fire Birds" was filmed in our hanger and some of our Apache pilots were extras) in the summer was miserable.

[solsys]

That guy was stationed in Germany at some point. The nametapes are German made as well as the rank. That is the only place I ever saw those made and I had a couple of uniforms with the open faced sham shield on them. I was stationed with 3ID in Wuerzburg from 88-90.

[Sabrejet]

That guy was stationed in Germany at some point. The nametapes are German made as well as the rank. That is the only place I ever saw those made and I had a couple of uniforms with the open faced sham shield on them. I was stationed with 3ID in Wuerzburg from 88-90.

 

 

Is that why is surname is just one consonant away from being "controversial"?!

[MattS]

That guy was stationed in Germany at some point. The nametapes are German made as well as the rank. That is the only place I ever saw those made and I had a couple of uniforms with the open faced sham shield on them. I was stationed with 3ID in Wuerzburg from 88-90.

 

You are right, under the 70th ID is the ghost of an armored triangle! Probably 1st or 3rd AD, thanks for the comment!

[Wiryo]

Nice found mate

[Martinjmpr]

On 11/5/2011 at 7:07 AM, solsys said:

That guy was stationed in Germany at some point. The nametapes are German made as well as the rank. That is the only place I ever saw those made and I had a couple of uniforms with the open faced sham shield on them. I was stationed with 3ID in Wuerzburg from 88-90.

 

Yep, when I was a SP/4 I had embroidered rank like that.  It used to confuse a lot of people because from a distance it almost looks like a LTC oak leaf cluster.  More than once walking around the Albertshof garrison at Hohenfels in my K-pot I got saluted by someone who assumed I was an officer.  

 

Germany is the only place I've ever seen embroidered SPC rank insignia like that.  

[Vanderbilt]

On 3/8/2021 at 6:32 PM, Martinjmpr said:

 

Yep, when I was a SP/4 I had embroidered rank like that.  It used to confuse a lot of people because from a distance it almost looks like a LTC oak leaf cluster.  More than once walking around the Albertshof garrison at Hohenfels in my K-pot I got saluted by someone who assumed I was an officer.  

 

Germany is the only place I've ever seen embroidered SPC rank insignia like that.  

......I too was stationed in Germany in the early 80's. You saw a fair bit of sewn on enlisted rank but it was usually E-6 or above. 

[PFC Red]

Nice looking set Matt. Any chances you could post some pictures of the pants as well? I'm wondering if the pre-1985 BDU pants differ also, or just the coat. Found some info here and there about evolution of coats, but not much on pants.

[bravo_2_zero]

8 hours ago, PFC Red said:

Nice looking set Matt. Any chances you could post some pictures of the pants as well? I'm wondering if the pre-1985 BDU pants differ also, or just the coat. Found some info here and there about evolution of coats, but not much on pants.

pants have deeper cargo pocket pleats , knee tucks in a more lower position , cargo pocket buttons are more spaced apart to where the front one is almost unusable (too fiddly to open ) due to sewn down flap , camo print tends to be different on all four parts of the legs where as later have 2 that are same on both front legs and same on back legs. 

[PFC Red]

8 hours ago, bravo_2_zero said:

pants have deeper cargo pocket pleats , knee tucks in a more lower position , cargo pocket buttons are more spaced apart to where the front one is almost unusable (too fiddly to open ) due to sewn down flap , camo print tends to be different on all four parts of the legs where as later have 2 that are same on both front legs and same on back legs. 

Thank you for the description. Any pics? Those would help a lot to visualize, especially the camo mismatch you mention. I tried looking around the net for a pic but couldn't find one.

[bravo_2_zero]

10 hours ago, PFC Red said:

Thank you for the description. Any pics? Those would help a lot to visualize, especially the camo mismatch you mention. I tried looking around the net for a pic but couldn't find one.

These are my 1980 dated woodland trousers , these don't have the mismatch print because these are I believe are trial ones given the very early date. 

 

[PFC Red]

12 hours ago, bravo_2_zero said:

These are my 1980 dated woodland trousers , these don't have the mismatch print because these are I believe are trial ones given the very early date. 

 

So these are actually not the classic 1981 contract date type 1 pants to go with the Type 1 woodland coat with Elvis collar?

These are the only pics of allegedly "type 1" pants I could find on the web (from https://www.venturesurplus.com/products/usgi-type-i-bdu-trousers-woodland-camo/ ) but they also don't match your description Bravo, as the knee tucks don't appear to be positioned any significantly lower than any later pants (i.e. the post-1985 hot weather) and the pocket buttons also seem to be positioned in the usual spots. However these are also definitely twill fabric with a pre-1993/1995 cut.

[bravo_2_zero]

5 hours ago, PFC Red said:

So these are actually not the classic 1981 contract date type 1 pants to go with the Type 1 woodland coat with Elvis collar?

These are the only pics of allegedly "type 1" pants I could find on the web (from https://www.venturesurplus.com/products/usgi-type-i-bdu-trousers-woodland-camo/ ) but they also don't match your description Bravo, as the knee tucks don't appear to be positioned any significantly lower than any later pants (i.e. the post-1985 hot weather) and the pocket buttons also seem to be positioned in the usual spots. However these are also definitely twill fabric with a pre-1993/1995 cut.

100% not early ones , the cargo pocket folds look like 20mm return where the early ones are like 100mm, the knee folds are also too high for early dated ones too. 

[PFC Red]

A friend sent me some pictures of his 1981 contract date (type I) early BDU pants. The pocket buttons very close to the edge of the flap. However they knee tucks don't look particularly lower than the hot weather I have here for comparison (they are sewn in, though). They also don't seem to have any camo print mismatch from what I can see, however. Anyway, good for reference...